HELENA         We, Hermia, like two artificial gods,

Have with our needles created both one flower,

Both on one sampler, sitting on one cushion,

Both warbling of one song, both in one key,

As if our hands, our sides, voices and minds

Had been incorporate. So we grew together

Like to a double cherry, seeming parted

But yet an union in partition,

Two lovely berries moulded on one stem;

So with two seeming bodies but one heart,

Two of the first, like coats in heraldry,

Due but to one, and crowned with one crest.         (3.2.203-214)

Helena paints a vivid picture of just how close she and Hermia have been growing up: remember this, and this, and this? she asks. We, Hermia, like two artificial gods, have with our needles created both one flower, both on one sampler, sitting on one cushion—so there was a material record of their creativity, this shared sampler, almost text-like, materialising skill, craft, time, shared experience, mirrored movements—as if they’d created a poem or a story together, too, close together, sharing a seat, huddled over a single band of linen. There’s a soundtrack too: we were both warbling of one song, both in one key—harmony, total harmony, and unison!—as if our hands, our sides, voices and minds had been incorporate. It was like we were sharing a body! So we grew together like a double cherry—a sweetly sensual image, not least because so often used to suggest lips—seeming parted but yet an union in partition; a double cherry looks like two fruit, but really it’s a single unit, just divided in two, whole, not separate; two lovely berries moulded on one stem. Yes, we were like that, two in one, and one in two, so with two seeming bodies but one heart—we shared everything, like we were the same person!—two of the first (two bodies), like coats in heraldry, due but to one, and crowned with one crest: the heraldic metaphor imagines two coats of arms united under a single crest, like the union of two families in marriage; it confirms that the relationship with Hermia that Helena is so passionately, nostalgically describing was marriage-like in its intimacy, not necessarily erotic, but with a similar sense of incorporation, total union of hearts and minds, if not of bodies.